Tag: event

So originally myself and Emma had planned to go to Warsaw for a little tourist trip, but sadly she had to cancel her holidays, so I used it as an opportunity to catch up with some good friends and check out Sneakerness Warsaw.

I knew as soon as I booked the flights with Air France and the short connection in Charles de Gaulle that there would be issues, and rightly so… my bag never made it from one plane to another. Big up Air France, nice job. Thankfully, I got my bag delivered to the hotel the next evening.

I stayed at the Radisson Blu Centrum for three nights, and thankfully it’s location meant that it was perfect for being able to reach the Sneakerness Warsaw event in under 10 minutes walk, as well as only being a short distance away from the main tourist spots. Definitely recommend it.

Arriving quite late in the evening on Friday, and after the carry on with my bag still being in transit, all I wanted to do was chill out, and get my bearings for the Sneakerness Event on the Saturday, so I headed to the Pałac Kultury i Nauki where the event was being held to check it out.

Now this place is pretty cool, and extremely tall, stands out like a sore thumb in the middle of Warsaw, but definitely the craziest place I’ve ever been to for a sneaker event.

Warsaw’s edition of Sneakerness was definitely the perfect event to pop my Sneakerness cherry, and a big shout out to all the great people who worked tirelessly to pull off the third Sneakerness in Warsaw.

Although the Warsaw edition isn’t the biggest out of all the Sneakerness events, it certainly had all bases covered, whether that was from shoes for sale such as recent releases, collaborations, vintage pairs, or the combination of good music, free entry, and even the cookies & cream ice cream which was on offer, all the necessary boxes were checked.

It had been long overdue, but finally, on the 1st of August 2015, Scotland had it’s first ever sneaker festival – Solebloc, held in Glasgow, and it was an absolute banger. The event itself was held at the excellent SWG3, a warehouse in Glasgow’s West End, and was the best setting for the event.

Trainer events have taken the world by storm in recent years, and finally, August 2015 will see Scotland hosting it’s very first event – SoleBloc.

If you’re into trainers, chances are you’ll know about Hanon Shop, and on Saturday, August 1st 2015 they will be holding a lottery for three of their favourite collaborations at the SoleBloc trainer festival in Glasgow. They have announced that one pair from each of the following hanon collabs will be raffled with all proceeds being donated to CLAN Cancer Support in Aberdeen, Scotland:-

Asics x hanon Gel III ‘Wildcats’

New Balance x hanon 1500CHF ‘Chosen Few’

Adidas x hanon Centaur ‘Granite’

Each model is 100% deadstock from a small stash they kept aside from the initial launch. The winning pair from each collab will come with dust bag as per the original hanon store release.

The guidelines are as follows:-

Tickets can only be bought in person at the SOLEBLOC event

£1 (GBP) per ticket.

Each ticket will apply to 1 model of shoe only – A list of sizes will be available at the event

Unlimited tickets – Buy as many as you like!

Entrants must provide their shoe size, email address and social media account on each purchased ticket

Entrant must have a social media account

Buying tickets on behalf of someone else is okay. Details must be provided as above.

All proceeds will go to CLAN cancer support in Aberdeen

Winner will be emailed and tagged via their social media account after the event

This is a pretty special gesture from the Hanon Shop team, so be sure to head to SoleBloc on the 1st of August and buy some raffle tickets!

Many years ago, New Balance gear was seen regularly on the football field, and footballing greats such as Bryan Robson wore New Balance boots, but 2015 was to be the year that the brand would take a giant leap back into the footballing world.

First, New Balance announced that they would be sponsoring a number of players, including Tim Cahill, Vincent Kompany, Alvaro Negredo, Adnan Januzaj, Aaron Ramsey, Fernando Reges, Marouane Fellaini, and Samir Nasri. Secondly, they announced that they would be kit suppliers for the following teams, Liverpool FC, Celtic FC, FC Porto, Sevilla FC, Stoke City FC, the Panama National Team and the Costa Rica National Team.

If you watch football regularly, you may have spotted various pairs of New Balance boots being worn by some of the afore mentioned players, but I’ll bring you a post all about the boots at a later date.

Anyway, the Celtic FC kit was to be launched on the 4th of May 2015 at Celtic Park, so being that I support Celtic FC and New Balance as a brand, it was a no brainer, and I made the journey south for the event.

The event kicked off with a question and answer session with John Collins and John Kennedy who were wearing some NB training gear. Following this was the unveiling of the new home kit with a few players from the men’s first team, and a couple from the ladies’ first team, followed by a brief question and answer session with regards to the players’ thoughts on the new kit.

It seems like every week there are at least 5+ collaborations releasing, and I’m sure you’ll agree, it’s pretty hard to keep up, but Made in UK New Balance collaborations are few and far between these days, so when one of them come along, there’s always quite a bit of excitement surrounding it. Then when you throw in UK heavyweights Footpatrol from London, the anticipation for this collaboration was only ever going to increase!

Before I get into the private preview of the shoe, let’s take a look at the Footpatrol images of the New Balance 1500FPK, along with some details about the collaboration.

The release has been dubbed ‘Encyclopaedia’, and the tagline ‘Knowledge is Key’ has accompanied the collaboration since the first few teaser images were released. Footpatrol have came together with New Balance UK to pay homage to arguably the most informative and detailed reference source – the Britannica Encyclopaedia.

The Britannica Encyclopaedia was first published in 1768, and was produced in fifteen editions until it’s present physical volume in 2012, and this shoe uses this source of knowledge as it’s inspiration. If you look at the shoe, and then look at the Britannica Encyclopaedia pictured, it’s clear that the people of Footpatrol and New Balance have worked extremely hard to execute this concept to the highest of standards.

The New Balance 1500FPK has a screams premium at first glance, with it’s predominantly black upper, decked out in only the best materials, with plush suede on the toe wrap and ankle sections, complimented by some smooth black leather across the toe box, side panels and tongue. Some contrast gold detailing comes in the form of the embroidery on the tongue, heel logo and of course the traditional small single embroidered ‘N’ logo on the lateral side. The heel logo on the medial side features a blacked out double embroidered ‘N’ logo, which is a really nice touch. There is also an embroidered tab on the rear of the tongue, which features an illustration of a book with the tagline ‘Knowledge is Key’, while the insole takes elements from some of the content found in the Encyclopaedia, in an off white colour with an anatomical illustration of the human foot. It doesn’t end there though, as no shoe is complete without some reflectiveness in my opinion, and this comes in the form of the reflective piping around the ankle collar.

You’d think we’d be finished by now on the detailing front, right? But no, adding to the already class details, the shoe is sat on top of an off-white midsole, and has everyone’s favourite gum coloured outsole. As a little reminder as to who the brains are behind this collaboration, the famous Footpatrol gas mask comes in a black and gold swing tag. Finally the vibrant Red New Balance logo situated on the heel and the outsole is a nod to both the bookmarker found in the reference book and the flagship colour used on the NB logo.

With the release set for Saturday 24th January, Footpatrol and New Balance personally selected a small number of people, mainly press and loyal customers to join them for a special preview of the Footpatrol Encyclopaedia ‘Knowledge is Key’ 1500. The event took place at the stunning Library on St. Martin’s Lane, an exclusive private members club just off London’s famous Leicester Square, and this is where the original shots featured above were taken.

Here we would also be treated to a personal Q+A with the New Balance team – Tom Henshaw, Andy Okolowicz, Chris Hodgson, and Jamie Metcalfe, as well as an insight into the Footpatrol shoe, while being able to indulge in some fine food and drink. It’s quite rare to be treated to events of this form, as usually it’s just a case of a venue with some music and lots and lots of beer, but the efforts that both NB and Team FP went to organise this classy event fits in with the whole theme of the collaboration perfectly.

When we talk about New Balance, and discuss things online, a lot of the information is taken from various websites, or stuff you’ve picked up through the years, but to be sat down with people like Chris and Andy, and be able to tap into their comprehensive knowledge of all things NB, whether it’s creative or technical, it really is quite something. Hats off to Jimmy and the rest of Team Footpatrol too, who were more than happy to discuss any aspect of their great project, and obviously like us who were just grateful to be in the room, they were grateful to be one of the very few who are given the opportunity to work with New Balance UK and produce such a stunning shoe.

When you think about this project in more depth, and as was pointed out by Jimmy of Footpatrol, the use of the Encyclopaedia Britannica as inspiration for a Made in UK New Balance is very appropriate, especially since the Encyclopaedia has a long standing tie to British heritage – it even has a thistle for it’s logo! The Encyclopaedia is high quality to touch, and craftmanship is something that New Balance pride themselves on, especially when it comes down to materials, with only the finest being used on this project. One particular interesting fact mentioned by Chris Hodgson in relation to materials was that the leather used throughout the shoe, is in fact, waterproof, and it was sourced from English tanneries.

The New Balance 1500FPK sees a production run of around 1320 pairs, which doesn’t seem like all that many, but be sure to keep your eyes open for a worldwide release soon, but in the mean time, check out some pictures below from the event.

The Adidas Rouge has been causing quite a stir for a while now, as it is a special shoe for many Adidas collectors, often found in the same sentence as the word ‘grail’, and with the release of the reissue upcoming, you can only begin to imagine..

This shoe is set to see it’s first release since way back in 1976 when they were made in Austria, so as you might have gathered, coming across a vintage pair is pretty tough coming, and Adidas fans have been screaming for a reissue for years now. With Adidas having pretty much reissued every other shoe under the sun, it’s a wonder why we’ve had to wait so long for this one.

Anyway, Rouge is the French word for ‘Red’, and the shoe itself features a soft red bovine suede upper with contrasting royal blue leather drei-streifen and heel tab. The reissue will also feature a suede tongue, and everyone’s favourite gum sole.

To celebrate the launch of the Rouge, Adidas Originals and hanon shop came together and put on a pop-up shop on Thursday 30th of October. The shoes would be available to purchase on the night, with various types of French food available to eat and plenty of Parisian beer to wash it down.

With the event kicking off at 6pm, and a couple of days before the official release, this gave punters the opportunity to grab their pair before everyone else, and a lengthy queue had already formed for opening.

As always with Adidas of late, they’ve been bang on with their graphics, and artwork was done by a man who seems to be making big moves of late, and thoroughly deserved, with his own recent Adidas collaboration, Peter O’Toole (@peterotooleart on Instagram). The clean typography was compiled by Lucas Jubb (@ljjubb on Instagram) and all graphics looked excellent, a really great job by those involved.

Some Stockholms were also on display along with the Rouge to coincide with their reissue later in the year, but unfortunately, it was my pair of 08 Stockholms on display rather than the reissue which only has some subtle changes, namely the sole unit.

Many people seemed to just come down to pick up a pair of Rouge, but a big shout to all those new and old faces who stayed around, drank some uber strong beer, ate all the food, and talked all things trainers. Also, a massive thanks to both Adidas and hanon shop for the hospitality. Until next time!